by Kunle Oluwunmi

 If a man is a beast who rapes whatever woman is nearest when he’s horny, then rape is no crime; it would merely be an unfortunate event. Rapists are normal, he says. However, Kenechi is sure rape is a crime, and a crime that should be punished. How can he survive this cognitive dissonance?

Hauwa Gambo might have refused to “waste her words” on Kenechi  Uzochukwu, but I think someone should deconstruct his arguments. A lie left undisputed clutters the mind, leaving little space for truth.

I tried to deconstruct his argument; but he doesn’t have one. His piece [which has been taken down following his apology] is a stunning mix of non-sequiturs, quotes from the Bible and questions that manage to sidestep the reasons why rape occurs, and why women are frequently attacked.

Kenechi is confused; he claims that rape is a crime, but men are not to blame. A fundamental aspect of any crime is malicious intent (mens rea). If a man is a beast who rapes whatever woman is nearest when he’s horny, then rape is no crime; it would merely be an unfortunate event. Rapists are normal, he says. However, Kenechi is sure rape is a crime, and a crime that should be punished. How can he survive this cognitive dissonance?

I’ll tell you how. Male privilege manifests itself in various ways, but one way (which Mr. Kene has illustrated) is his insistence that the way a woman dresses is a provocation, and that that woman would  responsible for the rape that she suffers.  Women “attack men” he says, through indecent dressing. These men, according to him, are pushed to rape. I’ll give you a statistic; Mary Koss (in her 1987 study of rape prevalence) estimated that only 4.5% of US college-aged men had committed rape. Kene obviously believes the 95.5% that didn’t had never come across a woman while aroused. If the majority of men can control themselves, what is wrong with men like Kene, who must rape every time they spy a panty line or cleavage?  Women don’t share any responsibility for the crime of the rapist. Would you blame your rich neighbor for having wealth that attracts robbers?

It’s not just disturbing that Kene holds that “men must rape something”, he also holds that  unfortunately for women, they  are the ones that have to deal with it(it is a “woman’s palaver”).  In connection with his belief that rape is women’s fault (or that it doesn’t matter whose fault it is), he also doesn’t think it is a man’s responsibility to control himself or restrain himself from forcing his genitals on a woman.  The woman should dress thickly to prevent an assault. Oddly enough, Kene says that even a well-dressed woman may face rape if the men around her are horny (how is rape a woman’s fault, then?)

Male privilege involves evading responsibility for your actions and pinning them on others, because as a man you believe you can do what you want to do, or you have to do what you want to do. This is a false belief; we are responsible for our actions.  Men that believe that rape is not really their fault are wrong. Clemetine Ford diagnoses this belief they believe “the world and all that the world and all its choices belong to them, while women are obliged to merely figure out how they want those choices to affect them.” At the heart of this, when you think about it, is the proposition that men and women are not equal. I’m sure even Kenechi would not argue in support of that idea.

Kene,

-A woman’s clothing is not an invitation to rape. What a woman wears is none of your business.

-Many of us don’t have sex with people that are unwilling; why do you feel you must?

-Rape is a crime; it is unacceptable that some people disrespect others by assaulting their bodies and sexuality, because the choice to have sex (or not) is part of the dignity of every human person.

I notice I haven’t quoted the Bible yet and I just couldn’t deprive Kenechi of a Bible verse. Perhaps the following Bible verse (and others like it) are part of the reason Kene thinks rape isn’t really the rapist’s fault:

“Of the woman came the beginning of sin, and through her we all die.” (Eccles. 25:22)

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Kunle Oluwunmi (@louiswindsor)

 

Op-ed pieces and contributions are the opinions of the writers only and do not represent the opinions of Y!/YNaija.